Here's a collection of vero (stripboard) and tagboard guitar and bass effect layouts that we have put together covering many classic and popular effects in growing numbers. Many of these have been posted on freestompboxes.org, so check that site out for great discussions on building your own effect pedals. Enjoy the builds and please also visit us on Facebook and Twitter

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Sunday, 5 February 2012

Lovepedal Kalamazoo

Update: aegert on FSB has experimented with the circuit and has found that putting a low value cap like 820pf between pins 1 and 2 of the opamp really improved the pedal. He also suggests that a 500K log pot is much better for the Gain control, so give that a go.

Update 2: daz at FSB has corrected some values from an original pedal he examined. New vero layout below, and it may still be worth adding that 820p cap between opamp pins 1 and 2 to see if there is still an improvement. You can also try something lower like 47 to 470p if the 820p cuts too much high end, or socket and swap to taste maybe.

I just saw this update yesterday.. I ordered the parts and have made the corrections this morning. I also included a socket for the 820p cap (which I omitted originally), and swapped the gain pot for audio. I bought a selection of opamps to try out as well. I can't test it yet though, I'm waiting on a delivery for a new power supply (it's out for delivery as we speak). As soon as I have tested it, I'll let you know what I think.

Did the mods, it sounds much better now.. far smoother, the tone/glass knobs have a better range - it was on the ice pick side of things before. I added the 820p cap, it just seemed to increase hiss - so I removed that. The gain pot is better as linear, audio gives you less control in my opinion. Different op-amps made little to no difference at all, at least to my ears - I can't even remember what I left in there. Cheers for the layout, and the updates IvIark.. appreciated muchly.

Hi IVIark,Built this one as well and put into the same box with eternity. Nice sounding overdrives. My only problem is that glass makes hardly audible difference while tone works well. Checked a couple of times the wiring and a board but everything seems to be fine. My last try will be replacing the pot, but what else could cause that?Thanks.

Hey Ivlark, first time posting and it's my first veroboard build. I've down plenty of PCB builds, so this is a little embarrassing, haha. I built the Kalamazoo today but I'm getting no gain at all and I have to crank the volume just to get it close to unity volume when the pedal is off. Any ideas? I'm going to go over it with fresh eyes tomorrow so I'll try to diagnose the problem, but if you have any ideas I'm all ears. In any case, thanks for the layout! This is one I've been dying to build for quite some time.Sub question:When you say a point goes to "tone 2 and 3 and glass 1" do you need to run separate wire from that point to each, or can you simply run a wire to tone 2 and then chain tone 2 to tone 3 and glass 1? I hope that makes sense.

yeah man, I'm at a loss. I've checked it over a dozen times. All the electrolytics are faced properly, all the diodes have negative pointing correctly, everything is grounded properly, no solder bridges... I'm stumped. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

In this link here:http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zCbjKeMgiMU/TxV1NCf2s7I/AAAAAAAAAlA/-tcZqYkHh3c/s1600/lovepedal_kalamazoo.jpg

I see 5 poly caps (grey rectangles) and three electro caps (round).Is this last scheme a modded version? If so could you point out the original?I do not know much about this, so I am only describing what I see... and could be wrong.

In every pedal Lovepedal always include a 100n capacitor in parallel with the main power supply filter cap (47u electro on the right). I always omit this because I think it's irrelevant, but if you want to include it just put a 100n between 9V and ground (next to the 47u would be the obvious place but you'll need a extra column). Alternatively you could solder it straight across the lugs on your DC adapter. I think if you listened to the difference you'd probably agree that it's a lot of messing for no difference whatsoever.

Ok, got this built today. All the knobs work perfectly, glass has a good and usable range, tone as well. I put the 820pF cap in, IC is a 1458 and I combined two resistor to achieve that 2k74 value.... A nice sounding overdrive, thank you for sharing and c'mon guys, let's build this amazing stompbox!Again thank you so much Ivlark.

Hi, So I bought what I thought would be a LP Kalamazoo clone on E-Bay.It seems to be more of a boost pedal when using level and drive knobs, and tone and glass dont seem to do much at all except make a rather unpleasant squeal when glass knob is turned all the way up.I showed it to a pal and he said it shouldn't be to hard to solve with a little expert advise...So,Is there a kind of step by step guide out there for diagnosing probs?Although I have never built a pedal, I do have some electronics skills and understanding....Could anybody give some pointers??Thanks in advance...

Hi ! I need help !I tried 3 times to do this pedal. No sound coming from this i checked the layout, everything is the same. When I i cut the vero's ground i'm getting the input signal and the ground, just the volume pot's working. I can't figure out where the problem is coming from. Please help me !By the way, thank you Ivlark for your amazing work !Georges

D1 to D4 are 1N914, for D5 use either a 1N5817 or 1N4001. The 1N5817 is preferable because it's lower voltage drop means you'll be closer to 9V (a series protection diodes reduces the voltage by the diodes forward voltage drop), but I mentioned both because more people are likely to have 1N4001s and may not want to get the other type in specially. Or omit D5 entirely along with the cut if you're not bothered about it.

As long as you're somewhere close you can always use a different value. Tolerances in carbon film resistors can be as much as 5% or sometimes even 10% and so that's a good guide as the how close you want to be to be acceptable deviation, even for component accuracy.

Somehow in my unbiased opinion I am thinking Sean Michael at Lovepedal designed the hell out of this pedal and it hits a Klon tone on lower gain which is just outstanding. Why mess with the circuit? Would be a nightmare for me to lose the magic it has going on.

Ok I'm very new to pedal building and have been wanting to build a klon clone but parts are hard to get in my country(South Africa). From all the demos I've seen the klon and kalamazoo sound indistinguishable to my ears. Would this build satisfy my klon needs? oh and here we seem to only have RC4558 chips not JRC4558 is this the same thing? heres a link: http://za.rs-online.com/web/p/operational-amplifiers/0303444P/

Sorry for the silly questions and thanks for the amazing layouts! There's about 20 I already want to build.

I've never built a Kalamazoo but the demos sound excellent to me. All the other Lovepedal circuits I've built have sound great too, so even if this isn't exactly the Klon sound you'll still be getting an excellent sounding pedal. Plus this will be a lot easier to build as a first pedal.

To answer your question, an RC4558 and a JRC4558 are the same chip but made by different manufacturers. The RC and JRC are the manufacturer code. Some people get really caught up in try to get the exact version of a chip and pay a fortune for them but in my experience the difference is minimal. My advice would be to put a socket where the chip goes, get the most reasonably priced one now and then you can always experiment later by swapping the chip.

Thanx so much! So I can probably guess that if I see a dual op-amp with 4558 in its part no its most likely right.

Another question when I search op-amps for instance a TL072 I'll get a bunch of variations like TL072CP or TL072IP are these last digits negligible? should i just aim for any low noise op-amp out of the range?

Again apologies for the elementary questions. Hopefully it helps some other newbies like me too.

Oh and lastly is there any sort of component substitute chart or site where one can compare and see what to experiment with?

Opamps have different suffixes for a number of reasons, but they usually just denote things like ROHS compliance, the form (DIP8, SOIC8 etc) and operating temperature range. So as long as it's DIP8 I wouldn't worry about the suffix.

This one sounds great so far as I can tell by my initial tests (at low volume due to it being somewhat late). However I did notice as some others did that the glass knob seemed to do hardly anything. I don't think this is normal... Any ideas?

Hi All, I've just assembled this project, unfortunately i cannot get it to work... I've rechecked the whole circuit and found a couple of mistakes, but still i only get a sine wave type of pitch coming from the amp. Bypass is working, input voltage and ic voltage seems ok; diodes and condenser polarities ok as well. IC socket and polarity are ok...

I have bought some larger components for my 1590B box (pots and condenser) Should i look for ground problems?

I am getting a devastating POP when this thing is switched on or off on my pedalboard. I know most circuits have a 1M or 2M pulldown resistor at the beginning and sometimes at the end to stop this. For this pedal - i see the 1M at the input, but i don't see any pulldown before the output to Vol 3. Would sticking a 1M from the empty hole right before the Vol 3 to the ground strip stop this? or might there be something else going on.

Once the pedal is engaged, it is one of the best sounding overdrives i've ever played through. Couldn't be happier with the layout or the build. I didn't have any 150n or 220n caps either.. just put 100ns in both places and nothing seems to be adversely affected. I gather those are part of the tone or glass controls anyway, so they aren't super critical.

I'm guessing your pop comes from the LED. The 1M at the input takes care of the input switching, and volume pot takes care of the output. That pot is in fact a 100K resistor from output to ground. Snip the LED and see if that helps. If it does.. Well. http://www.muzique.com/lab/led.htm+m

I went through the AMZ techniques for stopping the LED pop. Makes no difference. Taking the LED out of the circuit makes no difference, so i'm stumped.

On think I do notice - if the volume knob is turned all the way down, there is no pop - it is related to the overall output level. Also - when the pedal is on, every other pedal down the chain pops. It's like the signal coming out of it is too hot. not sure what that is all about.

I suppose it's possible that my capacitor substitutions could have affected it? but swapping a .1u for a .15u i wouldn't think would cause an issue - those are part of the tone circuit anyway, so i'm thinking that is unlikely.

Hi ! Very nice sounding pedal, however my drive pot does absolutely nothing ! All other pots work, though it sounds as if the tone pot works in reverse...What should I check for the drive pot ?Thanks |v|ark !

Built the Kalamazoo with the Boost Tiger (and added master volume) in one enclosure here: http://instagram.com/p/e1j6o6wBWQ/

I recently created a demo for the Kalamazoo and comparing my built to the original one I only noticed a difference in the range of the glass knob. The original has more treble in the highest setting and less bass in the lowest setting. I didn't add the 820pf cap, would that make it brighter?

Built the Kalamazoo with the Boost Tiger (and added master volume) in one enclosure here: http://instagram.com/p/e1j6o6wBWQ/

I recently created a demo for the Kalamazoo and comparing my built to the original one I only noticed a difference in the range of the glass knob. The original has more treble in the highest setting and less bass in the lowest setting. I didn't add the 820pf cap, would that make it brighter?

build it today.the 2nd update with no 820p cap...nice od.seems like tone works backwoards, but no big problem.just used 1m for 500k pot for drive....does anyone know what does this do to the gain? so if it's so much difference i'll change it in the future when i'll get a 500k pot...thanks again for the great layouts mark!

Definitely something wrong with the right hand channel then. Check all around pins 5, 6 and 7, make sure there are no unwanted bridges between rows. Re-do all the cuts including the ones underneath the IC, and if you're still having problems after that lot post a front and back pic of your build.

Thanks. Found it. Got to get myself a white stick. An unsoldered IC pin. And not the first time that happens. And such a simple build and I really checked it multiple times. I guess it just helps when somebody points something out to narrow the search. Thanks!!

Hi, I've built this pedal last night.It's working great !!!But, the problem is that i didn't see much different beetween Tone and Glass.Also, the Tone pot is reversed, i'm sure i already connect exactly like the pict. pin 1 goes to 1K, pin 2 & 3 is linked and goes to pin 5 of JRC4558.

I have a question about noise. Is cabling from potentiometers, input/output jack, 3PDT switch, DC input to the veroboard can make noise? If so, what should i do? change the cable quality? avoid using cable? or is there any options?

Wow, thanks again for a wonderful layout! Just boxed it. Sounds amazing. It doesn't cut as much of your tone as my tubescreamer, and is much smoother than my RAT. Very transparant, but enough grain to make your guitar sound just that little bit more 'electric' or 'amplified'.Thanks!

your voltages are wrong in both sides of ic.check for unwanted bridges.take a razor and clean all your cuts and rows.you can also check again if you've put any component in the wrong place.if problem remains then post some pictures of both sides of your board to see if someone spots the mistake.

Note

Not all these layouts are verified and some are put together from unverified schematics. So if you have good luck, or bad luck for that matter, then please let me know by dropping a comment in the topic. Thanks.

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